


Manifest

by GloriaMundi



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural, Community: au_bingo, Ghosts, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-28
Updated: 2011-02-28
Packaged: 2017-10-16 00:18:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/166396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GloriaMundi/pseuds/GloriaMundi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cobb receives a warning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Manifest

A blond man shoulders the door open and strides in as though he owns the place. (Maybe he does, now.) There's a small, slim girl following him, lugging a silver case.

 _I know him._

 _Christ, yes. Dominic Cobb, isn't it? Judging from appearances, I'd say he's finally got over his ex-wife._

 _Her? She's too young for him. Looks more like one of his students._

"It's really cold in here," complains the girl, hugging herself.

"We'll get a space heater," says Cobb. "Saito can pay for it."

 _Saito? You think he's trying again?_

 _He'd better not. Too many good people died already._

 _You should know, darling._

 _Saito only employs the best._

 _Such as yourself, for example. And, at the risk of immodesty, me._

 _We weren't good enough to get the job done. That's why they're here._

 _We were more than good enough to get the job done, Arthur. We simply didn't have the necessary background -- and before you start castigating yourself, there was no way we could've found out about Fischer's medieval security precautions._

 _I still don't have a clue about --_

 _I know, Arthur, I know._

In the cold room, amidst the dust-sheeted furniture, Cobb is kneeling and unpacking the silver case: instant coffee, a travel kettle, a tatty paperback bestseller, a laptop.

 _Think you can hack it?_

 _No need. He's not going to lock it down if he thinks he's alone._

 _Point. So: what are we going to do?_

 _We? This isn't a team, Eames. I've got a job to --_

 _The hell you have! Saito paid you to carry out a specific task. You failed --_

 _So did you._

 _Not really the point, Arthur. My point is, Saito's money -- which I profoundly hope you received, and spent, before the job commenced -- was the fee for retrieving that bloody painting that's upstairs in Fischer's father's bedroom._

"Why did Saito even hire us for this?" asks the girl, twitching a dustsheet aside and peering underneath it. "There are plenty of good thieves around, and it's not exactly our area."

"He thinks there's an additional layer of security involved," says Cobb. "Rumour has it we're not the first to attempt to steal the picture."

"What happened to the others?"

Cobb shrugs. "I guess they failed."

 _The Bacon. Which I couldn't extract from the premises due to the presence of a completely unpredictable boobytrap --_

 _And I couldn't extract due to the repercussions of that trap. But it wasn't your job to deter me --_

 _I tried, asshole._

 _And it's not your job, or mine, to deter Cobb and his lovely assistant._

 _Do you know Cobb?_

 _Never worked with him._

 _Well, trust me on this: you do not want to spend eternity with him._

"So what level of security are we talking? Laser beams? CCTV? I can --"

"Ariadne," says Cobb wearily, "I don't know yet. But I do know that there've been several attempts to steal the picture, and none of them have succeeeded, and nobody's talked about what went wrong."

"Someone must have set it up," insists Ariadne. "Someone must know what Fischer's got."

 _Ariadne, eh? She looks --_

 _Are you seriously hitting on a juvenile, Mr Eames? Really? Now?_

 _I was merely observing that she's too young to have lived much. Too young to die. Though I might add that I find myself perfectly content to be, er, 'hitting on' you._

 _Okay. Then we have to warn them off._

 _Absolutely. Did you have a method in mind? I'm all ears, Arthur._

 _I tried --_

 _I'm sorry, but a warning's not much cop unless the recipient can actually perceive it._

 _What was I supposed to do? You were completely oblivious to every sign I left you, and I couldn't exactly leave you a note on the --_

 _Wait._

Cobb's busy setting up his laptop, plugging in peripherals. Eames lets his presence, his locus, drift down over Cobb's hands, sinking into the spaces between the keys.

"We need to get that space heater sooner rather than -- Cobb?"

"Look at this, Ariadne," says Cobb, beckoning her over.

"QUIT TEH JOB," reads Ariadne. "PAINTING PROTECTED BY STAET OF ART SECURITY. Okay, so you've been targetted by a dyslexic hacker. Don't you have a firewall?"

 _Asshole. Spelling matters._

 _Piss off, Arthur._

"LETHAL DEATHTRAPS. ALSO EVIL SPIRITS," Ariadne finishes. "What the hell, Cobb?"

Cobb squints into the shadowy corners of the room. "Eames?" he says, uncertainly.

"Who? Cobb, what is going on?"

"Guy I know," says Cobb, glancing around as though, if he's quick enough, he might see something. Someone. "Art thief, mostly. Last time I saw him, he was heading up this way -- Boston, he said -- for a job. Nobody's heard from him since. Couldn't spell to save his life. If he's somehow warning us off --"

 _Okay, I take it back. You fucked up the spelling on purpose. But evil spirits?_

 _Would you prefer I'd written something like 'Irritating ghostly presences, apparently doomed to hang around Fischer's New England residence forever in a disembodied state which means they can't fuck one another as they --'_

The laptop crashes to the floor, beeping: Ariadne shrieks, and Cobb swears and drops to his knees to scoop it up.

 _Fuck you, Eames. Look: Cobb's packing up._

 _Leaving us alone together. Arthur, you're actually a romantic: I wish I'd known you when --_

 _Yeah. Me too._

Soon the room is, for all intents and purposes, empty once more.

-end-


End file.
